Eliahu Elath (Hebrew: אליהו אילת), born Epstein (1903–1990)[1] was an Israeli diplomat and Orientalist. He immigrated from Russia to Palestine in 1924, and spent a decade in Beirut as a student and journalist.[2] From 1934 to 1945 he was an "informator" for the Jewish Agency, which eventually evolved into the government of Israel (as described by V. Jacobson in 1934 in “Report on my trip to Eretz Israel and Syria”, 12 may, 1933).[1] That same year he came to the United States as the agency's representative in Washington, D.C., and from 1948 to 1950 he served as the first Israeli ambassador to the United States.[3] Following that appointment he served as the Israeli ambassador to the United Kingdom from 1950 to 1959, and later as the president of Hebrew University from 1962 to 1968.[1]